…To Create A Writing Empire

Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing

Easy on the Adverbs, Exclamation Points and Especially Hooptedoodle

By ELMORE LEONARD
From The New York Times

These are rules I’ve picked up along the way to help me remain invisible when I’m writing a book, to help me show rather than tell what’s taking place in the story. If you have a facility for language and imagery and the sound of your voice pleases you, invisibility is not what you are after, and you can skip the rules. Still, you might look them over.

I’d like to say that don’t always follow what big writers say. Having a prologue can get the reader into the story more than just a normal chapter could. It’s also the same with using other things than ‘said.’ It would drive me NUTS to read every single line after dialogue with ‘said.’

And not describing characters is a bad rule as well. I’d look to know what the character looks like. : )